Music facilities and resources

Southampton enjoys extensive music facilities incorporating well-equipped teaching spaces and rehearsal rooms. We offer 18 practice rooms in addition to larger rehearsal spaces both within the department and at the Turner Sims Concert Hall, as well as practice facilities in some of our halls of residence. In addition, we provide two integrated recording and studios whose equipment is updated annually, and a smaller complementary studio for preparatory work. Our resources include a dedicated music computing cluster of 16 networked multimedia workstations with internet access and music software.

Music is proud of its collection of instruments. These include a substantial keyboard collection with some outstanding period and modern instruments--several early pianos, modern concert grands, and harpsichords, a clavichord and a fine organ--as well as practice instruments. We have a further collection of modern orchestral instruments, such as alto flute and bass clarinet, available for loan to students, and two rehearsal rooms are equipped with back-line amplification and drumkits for jazz and pop performance. We have a wide range of tuned and untuned percussion housed in a special percussion room. For players interested in early music performance, we have a Baroque lute, a chest of viols, a consort of recorders, two Baroque violins and a Baroque cello with bows. We acquired a pair of Baroque flutes by Martin Wenner  in 2007, and a Renaissance lute by Martin Haycock in 2008. 

The Hartley Library on the main campus holds an excellent collection of reference and borrowing materials. It includes a Music Resources Room that contains our CD, video and DVD holdings, fully equipped with multiple listening and viewing stations. The Library also holds the Norman Del Mar collection of early recordings and the Anna Mahler collection of scores and materials belonging to Gustav, Alma and Anna Mahler.